Run your school competition once. Run it every year.
One platform to run school competitions end to end (olympiads, arts & performance, and project fairs), replacing spreadsheets, email, and paper with one guided workflow.
Configure once, clone next year in one click. No developer needed.
Trusted by Turgut Özal and other organizers running competitions on NextArena
Running a competition shouldn’t take a spreadsheet army.
Most organizers stitch together five tools and hope nothing breaks. NextArena replaces the whole stack.
Spreadsheets, email & paper
- Scattered spreadsheets nobody trusts
- Endless email threads & lost attachments
- Paper answer sheets, graded by hand
- Disputed results with no audit trail
One guided workflow
- One source of truth, live for everyone
- Guided workflow from sign-up to certificate
- Auto-graded exams & rubric scoring
- Defensible rankings with full audit trail
How NextArena runs a school competition, in six stages
From first setup to final certificate, click any stage to see what happens.
Configure the edition
Set editions, categories, phases and rules once. Everything downstream inherits your setup.
Everything a competition needs, end to end
Each stage of the workflow, built into one platform your whole team shares.
Configure once, clone every year
Set up editions, categories, phases and rules a single time. Next year’s edition is one click away, no developer, no rebuild.
- Editions, categories & competition phases
- Reusable rule sets and scoring schemes
- Clone last year’s setup in one click
Smart registration with eligibility built in
Applicants and schools register through guided forms. Eligibility and quotas are enforced automatically. Invalid entries never reach your jury.
- Auto-enforced eligibility & quotas
- Category routing without manual sorting
- Live registration status per school
Anti-cheat seating, assigned by rule
Generate seating blueprints that keep schoolmates apart, then auto-assign jury and invigilators across venues, no manual rosters, no conflicts.
- Rule-based seat blueprints per venue
- Auto-assignment of jury & invigilators
- Conflict & load balancing across rooms
Mobile rubric judging, score anywhere
Jurors score on weighted criteria straight from their phones, with sliders and stars. Progress is live, so you always know who’s done.
- Weighted criteria with sliders & stars
- Live jury progress & active tiles
- Configurable evaluation per category
Automated OMR exam grading
Print pre-filled answer sheets, scan them back, and auto-grade with penalty rules. Re-grade instantly when rules change, without re-uploading a thing.
- Pre-filled, scannable answer sheets
- Penalty rules for wrong answers
- Re-grade without re-uploading scans
Instant, defensible rankings
Aggregate every score, apply tie-breakers, and allocate award tiers automatically. Every number traces back to its source. Disputes end here.
- Automatic aggregation & tie-breaking
- Award-tier allocation in one view
- Full audit trail behind every rank
Certificates & ceremony in one click
Generate every certificate in bulk and an auto-built award-ceremony slide deck, ready to present the moment results are final.
- Bulk certificate generation
- Auto-built award-ceremony slide deck
- Shareable, verifiable published results
Why NextArena beats spreadsheets and generic event tools
All three contest types, one tool
Olympiads, arts & performance, and project fairs run side by side, no separate systems, no duplicate setup.
Automated OMR grading
Scan answer sheets and grade thousands of exams in minutes, with penalty rules and instant re-grading.
Anti-cheat seating & assignment
Rule-based seating keeps schoolmates apart and assigns jury and invigilators automatically, fair by design.
End-to-end with a full audit trail
Every action is logged from registration to certificate, so results are transparent and defensible.
Built for every role on the team
Eight role types, each with the right access and the right view, nothing more, nothing less.
Administrator
Owns the platform, settings & access.
Edition Admin
Runs a single edition end to end.
School Admin
Registers and manages a school’s entries.
Supervisor
Oversees venues and contest-day flow.
Finance
Tracks fees, payments & invoices.
Jury
Scores entries on weighted rubrics.
Invigilator
Manages seating & exam integrity.
Applicant
Registers, competes & gets certified.
Pricing built around your program
Every competition is different. Editions, categories, and scale all vary. Tell us about yours and we’ll put together a plan that fits.
Frequently asked questions
Everything organizers ask before running their first competition on NextArena.
What is NextArena?
NextArena is school competition management software that runs olympiads, arts & performance competitions, and project fairs end to end, from registration and anti-cheat seating to OMR grading, rankings, certificates, and the award ceremony, all in one platform.
How do I run a school olympiad with NextArena?
You configure the edition once (categories, phases, eligibility and scoring rules), then open guided registration, auto-generate anti-cheat seating, evaluate with rubric judging or automated OMR grading, and publish defensible rankings and certificates. No spreadsheets and no developer required.
Can I reuse my competition setup next year?
Yes. NextArena is built around editions: configure once and clone last year’s setup, including categories, rules and scoring schemes, into a new edition in a single click.
Does NextArena support arts competitions and project fairs, not just olympiads?
Yes. All three competition types (academic olympiads, arts & performance competitions, and project/science fairs) run side by side on the same platform, with rubric judging for subjective scoring and OMR grading for exams.
What is OMR exam grading and how does it work?
OMR (optical mark recognition) grading lets you print pre-filled answer sheets, scan them back, and grade thousands of exams automatically with penalty rules. If the rules change you can re-grade instantly without re-uploading any scans.
How does anti-cheat seating work?
NextArena generates rule-based seating blueprints that keep students from the same school apart, then auto-assigns jury and invigilators across venues by category and load, no manual rosters and no conflicts.
How are rankings and tie-breakers calculated?
Scores are aggregated automatically, tie-breakers applied, and award tiers allocated in one view. Every number traces back to its source through a full audit trail, so results are transparent and defensible.
Is NextArena available in Albanian?
Yes. NextArena is fully bilingual in English and Albanian, so organizers, schools and jurors can each work in their preferred language.
Ready to run your next school competition on NextArena?
Book a demo and we’ll walk you through your edition, from configuration to certificates, in 30 minutes.